


The Sad Gang

by MayoMayo



Series: The Sad Gang Cinematic Universe [1]
Category: Deltarune (Video Game)
Genre: F/F, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Heavy Angst, M/M, Non-Linear Narrative, Slow Burn, Slow To Update, Very Slow to Update
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-11
Updated: 2019-02-11
Packaged: 2019-10-26 10:18:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 493
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17744054
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MayoMayo/pseuds/MayoMayo
Summary: Hometown is an awfully small place to grow up. It's also a hard place to leave. The cute little storefronts and the quiet woods occupy a place deep, deep within you, and when you've been away for too long they start to sing, quietly, asking you to pop back in once in a while.When Azzy came home early he didn't find it so happy as when he'd left. He was the ticket out, the golden boy, and his mother, his neighbors, and frankly the whole town was less than enthusiastic when he moved back in and told them "Hey, I think I like music more than baseball."So here he stays, strumming his guitar, and mildly disappointed as they may be, the people of Hometown move on. The snow still comes down and the summers are still hot. And maybe, given time, another wave of kids might give the town a chance.For now, though, it's quiet again. Come on by. Take a seat under the bridge. Listen to some music with the Sad Gang.





	The Sad Gang

The door slammed, the lock clicked, and the keys rang like bells as he ducked beneath the threshold and into his dimly-lit room. What sun filtered in looked like godrays in the floating dust, and the smell of time and stale flowers wafted in the breeze like music left on too long as a party wound down. A good bit of elbow grease and a few grunts hefted open an ancient wooden frame, and while the outside air was far too cold, it was fresh. He needed fresh.

Seven glass bells sat, undisturbed, as they had for… how long had it been? A decade, perhaps. His boy was away and his other children visited him only so often as they drifted to their friends’ homes, perhaps a post-it or a head in the shop if they were feeling kind. Only the sun and the flowers shone in here. He was dim too.

No competition, downstairs. There might have been a general store a few miles away, with tchotchkes and keychains and a few buckets of water out front, but he had great glass windows and orchids and that pre-war counter downstairs, and of course the hardwood floors. What cleaning and refurbishing he could not do in his room he pulled off in the storefront. He truly lived there. What was upstairs? A television? A phone, a scantily-opened fridge, his letters. Mail. He opened it by the front.

He tromped across the carpet to the front counter, where a reasonable collection of envelopes had grown. A weed in concrete that had unfurled its paper leaves. He uprooted it and filed through its fruit.

Mostly spam and a campaign donation request from half a month ago. Did he vote? Had he remembered? Surely he did his bit. The “URGENT COLLECTION” seemed ham-fisted. It was ham-fisted. He wondered if that was illegal. Entrapment. Or something of its ilk. Could he-

An envelope, folded nearly in half. The lip was a quarter unsealed, and all to be heard inside was something between a shuffle and a rattle. A polaroid, he noticed, as its gloss corner revealed itself inch by inch. He removed it, careful to grip it by the white and not the color ink.

Four faces. Broad smiles. A long, long time ago. A burly young man playing a video game and a smaller boy over his shoulder. A face behind an awful perm and a pair of horns, seated on a bed near the door. And, partially cut off, another smile, hair pulled back, a sweater-clad arm and a peace sign held aloft, presumably holding the camera. Scrawled hastily in permanent marker (much newer than the image, as his thumb had smudged it) was a year and a phrase: “The Gang, 1983.”

Asgore sat silent for a moment. He turned the relic over in his hands.

He set it back down on the counter by the door and went inside again, to wash his hands.

**Author's Note:**

> First time I've picked up fanfic in two whole years. This project is going to be much, much larger than Ghettotale ever was, probably with multiple full-length fics stretching over a broad window of time. It might never be finished. Regardless, here I go again, with a teaser of a plot point you won't see again for a few months.


End file.
